In recent years, mobile wireless communications have become increasingly popular. Mobile devices are used to make voice calls, check email and text messages, update social media pages, stream media, browse websites, and so forth. In at least one estimate, mobile data traffic has grown 4,000 fold over the past 10 years. As a result, users expect their mobile devices to provide many functions, including reliably working on a mobile communication network to receive constant and dependable telecommunication and data communication services. The rapid proliferation of wireless networks and mobile computing applications has put additional demands on mobile communication networks.
Today, video usage is about 60% of data traffic for many mobile network carriers and is projected to increase steadily. In some projections, video usage could increase to 72% by the end of 2018. Furthermore, the resolution of available video content has steadily increased from standard definition (i.e., 480p), to high definition (HD) ready (i.e., 720p), Full HD (i.e., 1080p), and Ultra High Definition (UHD) (i.e., 4K). The ever increasing demand for video content is using valuable mobile communication network resources and may be depleting the data allotment for account holders.